Posting this episode because the plot of “Gung Ho” (1986) is basically happening all over again, with the US TSMC plant. The Taiwanese company is treating American workers they way they treat their Taiwanese workers (terribly), the company only wants to import Taiwanese construction workers because they don’t trust the Americans, and now Arizona may ban TSMC from importing more workers because this whole thing was pitched as a jobs program.

Some Arizonans who applied to work on this fab have indicated that TSMC is so distrustful of the local labor force that they are requiring some roles to relocate to Taiwan for 6-12 months for on the ground training, and offering below market rates for the privilege.

So if you haven’t heard it, here’s The Antifada episode where and talk about Gung Ho.

In this very special Antifada offering, Andy, Jamie and Sean are joined by your favorite sons: Matt Christman and Virgil Texas of Chapo Trap House.

Gang begins by addressing the central questions of our hyper-digital age: what if God friended you on Facebook? Is QAnon just a benign hobby for bored Boomers? And, holy shit, what if GOD WAS QANON?

Matt, Virgil and Jamie reveal - for the very first time - their respective political tendencies. Everyone marvels at how high-T Jeb(!) managed to lose the primary despite the PR coup of offering a poorly branded guaca bowle.

Crew get knee-deep into Paul Schrader’s 1978 classic “Blue Collar” starring Richard Pryor, Yaphet Kotto and Harvey Keitel’s genitalia. How does this movie about struggling union autoworkers help us understand the 70s as more than just bad hair and bell bottoms? (C.f. Jefferson Cowie’s “Stayin’ Alive” and the upcoming “Chapo Guide to Revolution: A Manifesto Against Logic, Facts and Reason”)

How did the “Golden Age” of US capitalism break down? How the hell did we end up in neoliberal hellworld when the 70s saw the most massive wildcat strike wave since the 30s? Why can’t we return to decadent late social-democracy complete with coke benders, shag carpets to bang across, crushed velvet noodie posters and modernist chairs made to look like cocks’n’balls? Ugh.

After the depressing grind of Blue Collar, Matt suggests we lighten the mood with “Gung Ho” (1986) starring Michael Keaton. What’s more uplifting after watching a film about declining racial solidarity among the US working class than one that uses stereotypes about the Japanese for cheap yuks? What’s more laughable than watching a town full of autoworker rubes look to a washed up high school jock to solve their employment crisis?

In a startling twist, the entire crew turns on the American working class as the indolent, entitled chuds they are: you will all wear Ribbons of Shame in the highly disciplined and sadistic Japanese-dominated future!

Luckily, this week’s viral wildcat video by a Hero of Socialist Labor saves us from going full MAGA. Spoiler: in the end our various tendencies are synthesized into Antoine Dangerfield Thought.